History

First church

The first church on the site was dedicated to Paul the Hermit, who had been buried in the Egyptian desert by Anthony the Great - it was in effect the cemetery chapel to the monastery of Saint-Éloi, founded by monks of saint Eloi of Noyon and Dagobert I. This monastery was on the site of what is now the parvise of the Palais de Justice. From there, bodies were carried in procession from the monastic community to the cemetery. Madame de Sévigné was baptised in this building in 1626, in the first chapel of Saint-Louis. The monastic cemetery was later forgotten, though the church retained a dedication to a saint Paul (albeit Paul of Tarsus not Paul of Thebes) up to the present day.

Construction

The first stone of the present building was laid by Louis XIII in 1627 for the Jesuits in the same street as the old chapel of St Paul. Its first name was 'église Saint-Louis de la maison professe des Jésuites', in reference to the Maison Professe des Jésuites attached to it.

Its design included traditional French elements as well as others inspired by Italy. In effect, as André Chastel put it "the Jesuit order, even while recommending certain aspects, as attentive to local traditions[1]". Also, it can easily be compared to the Gesu in Rome, though it is longer and wider than that church. Its plan is a compromise between the Gesu's single nave flanked by side chapels and the traditional French cruciform plan, as is to be seen in its long transepts. The tall windows in these prominent transepts and the short eastern apse allow in large amounts of light and the dome under the crossing also recalls Italian architecture of a slightly earlier period, such as that of Carlo Maderno. In contrast, the high proportions (the dome is 55 metres high) are more comparable to French Gothic architecture.

The façade is also Italian but with French Gothic verticality and Dutch high ornamentation. Its main inspiration was the 1618 façade of the église Saint-Gervais-Saint-Protais de Paris by Salomon de Brosse, which has the same design of three bays with two levels on the side bays and three levels for the central bay, highlighted by a projection and doubled columns. It uses Corinthian columns on the two lower levels and composite order columns on the rest.

17th century

The first mass was celebrated in the new building on 9 May 1641 (the feast of the Ascension) by cardinal Richelieu, with the oremuses pronounced by Bossuet. The famous Jesuit preacher Louis Bourdaloue preached some of his famous sermons in the church, for Lent and Advent, between 1669 (the date of his first sermon) and 1693. He also preached his famous funeral sermon for the Grand Condé in the church in 1687, whilst Bossuet and Fléchier also preached there.

The white marble high altar was moved and rebuilt under Louis-Philippe I with fragments from Napoleon's tomb at Les Invalides. The church was later renamed the 'église Saint-Paul-Saint-Louis' in memory of the church of Saint-Paul, which had been demolished in 1796. On 15 February 1843, Léopoldine Hugo secretly married Charles Vacquerie in the church - her father Victor Hugo offered the church two clam-shell holy water holders to mark the occasion, still to be seen in the church.

Delacroix painted Christ in agony on the Mount of Olives for the church, which is still to be seen there. The church also houses La vierge del Douleur by Germain Pilon (1586). On one pillar on the right side of the nave is a nearly-erased inscription 'République française ou la mort' (French Republic or death), probably dating to the Paris Commune of 1871.

The casing of the church's grand tribune organ was classified as a historic monument in 1867 and four years later (in 1871) its pipes were replaced by Martin. The whole organ was restored in 1972 by Danion-Gonzalez and now has 3 keyboards with 56 notes and a pedal board with 30 notes, along with electric transmissions and 40 pipes (of which 33 are reels). The choir organ is by Krischer and dates to the 19th century, with two keyboards of 56 notes, a pedal board of 30 notes, mechanical transmissions and 13 pipes.